You're at a party. Someone hands you a drink and asks the most unavoidable question there is: so, what do you do? Notice what happens next. They asked what you do, and you're about to answer with what you are. Nobody says "I do medicine." We say "I am a doctor." So what happens to "I am my job" when AI starts doing your job?

That question is bigger than "will a robot replace me." It's: who do you become if it does? To get there, I bring in a king condemned to push a boulder uphill forever, then Camus on why happiness doesn't have to wait for meaning, Arendt on the difference between doing the dishes and building a cathedral, and Hegel on why a kid throwing stones into a pond is doing something profound.

Where I stand: I've spent more than ten years building AI products, so this is not an episode about the machines coming for us. It's a question my own industry doesn't ask often enough.

I close on three questions no machine can answer for you. Sit with them this week, and the next time someone hands you a drink and asks what you do, your answer won't be a job title.

More questions between episodes, in my newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/the-french-philosopher-7216970073071104001/